Fed Gov warns banks need more capital

For the millionth time, if they're too big to fail, they are too damned big. What's so difficult to understand? The only thing stopping real change is the steady stream of fat checks for future jobs or political campaigns.

"An additional capital requirement should be calculated using a metric based upon the impact of a firm's failure on the financial system as a whole," Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

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Americans increasingly pessimistic about economy

And for good reason. Why should anyone have high expectations when those who created the recession are still on the loose? People voted for a lot more change than they've seen. Voting for the same old crowd with the same old ideas that got us into this mess won't fix the problem. It's unfortunate but neither political party has much of a clue which probably is why so many voters are so pessimistic.

Americans are growing increasingly doubtful about direction of the US economy, according to the latest survey from business-advisory firm AlixPartners.

In fact, an increasing number, some 61 percent, say they don't expect to return to their respective pre-recession lifestyles until the spring of 2014, if ever.

What's worse, a full 10 percent said they expect they will never return to pre-recession spending.

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Dems to recall Gov. Walker early next year

Via Markos and Twitter, we get this great news from Greg Sargent and the Plum Line blog (my emphasis):

There’s a long way to go, and the goal seems like a very tough one to reach, but Wisconsin Democrats are set to go for it: They will announce at their annual convention later today that they intend to launch an effort to recall the ultimate target — Scott Walker himself.

Mike Tate, the chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, will reveal the plan in a speech today [June 3] at the convention in Milwaukee, according to advance excerpts of the speech that were sent my way.

“We will not stand down — and next year, we will recall Scott Walker from office,” Tate will tell the crowd, according to the excerpts. “We will begin to repair the damage done to this state and we will begin a new with a Democratic Governor who will fight for our children, who will fight for our families, our teachers and our firefighters. We will fight for the people — not the powerful.”

You can't win if you don't play, and play hard. We'll have a Contribute link for that recall effort as it gets organized.

In the meantime, if you can, please contribute to the recall effort in the Wisconsin Senate by clicking below. Every bit helps and we're more than two-thirds there. Thanks!

Update: A huge thank you to the folks who got us above $4200 in the "finance the Wisconsin Senate Recall" effort below!

GP

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Syrian protests/violence grow: "We won’t forgive, we will kill the child killer." Horrific new video of the dead 13 y.o.

Killing one's own people because they want freedom is really beyond horrific. But, it's hard to find the words to describe a government that tortures and kills a 13 year old kid. In Syria, the death of Hamza Ali al-Khateeb has fueled a new round of protests, apparently larger than any seen to date. And, the Syrian Government is killing more of its citizens. Via the NY Times:

Syrians poured into the streets Friday in some of the largest antigovernment protests yet despite the shutdown of much of the country’s Internet network, which has been crucial to demonstrators’ ability to mobilize and a major source of information for those outside the country.

The worst violence Friday appeared to be in the restive city of Hama, where at least 40 protesters were killed in a continuation of a brutal nationwide government crackdown that has lasted for months, according to local activists. That report could not be immediately confirmed.

Friday’s demonstrations against the authoritarian rule of President Bashar al-Assad were fueled in part by escalating anger over the torture and killing of a 13-year-old boy from the southern region of Dara’a. The boy, Hamza Ali al-Khateeb, has become a symbol of government oppression after a video of his mutilated body was circulated on YouTube. On Friday, protesters in dozens of cities dedicated their marches to him and other children killed during the uprising.

“We won’t forgive, we will kill the child killer,” chanted protesters in Homs, a center of dissent, according to a witness who gave his name as Mohamed. “We will continue until your end.”

It's very difficult to watch, but the video of Hamza Ali al-Khateeb's mutilated body is here.

More from Al-Jazeera English:

Syrian security forces have opened fire on one of the largest anti-government protests in the 10-week uprising so far, leaving at least 34 people dead in the central city of Hama, activists said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the victims were killed on Friday as security forces dispersed a rally of more than 50,000 people in a city where thousands died in a failed 1982 revolt against the government.

The deaths came as president Bashar al-Assad's forces renewed their assault on towns seen as key to the demonstrations calling for an end to his family's 40-year rule.

Rami Abdul-Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the Hama protest was among the largest yet in the uprising that began in mid-March. He said security forces also shot dead one person in the village of Has in the northern province of Idlib.

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Palin rewrites history of Revolutionary War. She thinks Paul Revere warned the British.

When I was in eighth grade at Jack Junior High School in Portland, Maine, my English teacher, Rita Moore, made us memorize Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere." All of it. I still remember the first part, which begins:

Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, "If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light,--
One if by land, and two if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be,
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm,
For the country folk to be up and to arm."

Longfellow was from Portland and anyone who has visited Boston can still see the North Church.

Just about any student of American history knows about Revere's midnight ride to warn about the impending British attack. Not Sarah Palin. Apparently, she was absent that day. The GOP presidential contender (or not) thought Revere was warning the British about something:

Wow. Here's the transcript of how Palin described Paul Revere's famous ride, while visiting the Old North Church in Boston.  It appears she was asked something to the effect of, "do you know who Paul Revere was?":

He who warned the, the British that they weren't gonna be takin' away our arms [she pronounces it "are arms"], by ringin' those bells and makin' sure he's ridin' his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that we were gonna be secure and we were gonna be free.

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Ari Berman on the lobbying war against Elizabeth Warren

Ari Berman has a terrific new article in The Nation on the war against Elizabeth Warren as waged by bankers and the lobbyists who serve them.

For example, Berman details how banking newbie and freshman Republican Rep. Sean Duffy went from ignorant to informed as if by magic (my emphasis throughout):

On May 13 the House Financial Services Committee passed three bills designed to weaken the CFPB, which goes live on July 21. One was sponsored by freshman Representative Sean Duffy, the telegenic former star of The Real World: Boston. When he entered Congress, Duffy admitted he “wasn’t very familiar” with “banking issues, housing issues, insurance issues. These are specific issues that I didn’t deal with in my entire life.” Yet within a few months he found himself denouncing the CFPB as a “rogue agency” with an “authoritarian structure” and introducing legislation to give existing banking regulators greater authority to override the bureau’s new rules.

Then Berman explains who supplied the magic: banking lobbyists.

“I come from central and northern Wisconsin,” [Duffy] said. “This is not Wall Street, I promise you.” Yet the legislation has endeared him to the most powerful financial interests on Capitol Hill and K Street’s lobbying corridor. In recent months groups opposed to the bureau, such as the American Bankers Association (ABA), the American Financial Services Association (AFSA), the Credit Union National Association (CUNA), the Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA), the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) and the National Association of Federal Credit Unions (NAFCU), have donated thousands to Duffy’s re-election campaign. “Why is Sean Duffy sponsoring this legislation?” asks Ed Mierzwinski, director of the consumer program at USPIRG. “How many big banks are in Wausau, Wisconsin? This is all about money.”

A side note — I highlighted the National Association of Federal Credit Unions above for a reason. Unlike the others, credit unions really are small financial institutions, and they should be supporting Warren and the CFPB.

Wells Fargo won't listen to your complaints about their lobbying, but I'll bet your local credit union will, if you're a member. Care to test that? Why not pay them a little visit and see.

Don't email; write. Or better, walk in and hand your letter to the manager. Smile as you talk, and remind him or her that you see lots of other CU members as you stand around the water cooler, sharing little comments about this and that. You'd be glad to put in a good word. (I did say smile, right?)

As Berman notes, there's a ton of money flowing from Thank You Street:

The three chief sponsors of the CFPB bills—Duffy, Bachus and Shelley Moore Capito—received a total of $1.4 million from the finance, real estate and insurance sector during the 2010 election. Now they’re returning the favor. The GOP Congressional assault on the CFPB is a clever way for the caucus to appeal to the Tea Party’s antigovernment fervor while attracting prodigious campaign contributions from Wall Street and forcing the Obama administration to play defense on yet another critical piece of legislation.

Berman's piece contains a great backgrounder on the CFPB, its creation, and its unusual organizational constraints. But it's mainly about the Benjamins and the Congressional push to neuter the threat, with lots of well-gathered, gritty details.

Deceptive and predatory financial products may be ugly little beasts, but they're a terrific source of income for financial institutions (including payday lenders) and the CEOs who drink from them. After all, you can't get to that painfully low top marginal tax rate without raking in some bucks from somewhere. Where better than from the hapless and ill-informed?

All in all, an excellent article, and a good go-to piece for where we are today with Elizabeth Warren vs. the Lobbyists. Strongly recommended.

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AP: Romney's first day as a candidate, big ole lie

AP does a great job pointing out five big lies Mitt Romney made on his inaugural day as a presidential candidate.

In rhetorical excesses marking his entry in the presidential campaign, Mitt Romney said the economy worsened under President Barack Obama, when it actually improved, and criticized the president for issuing apologies to the world that were never made.

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Faltering jobs numbers, a wake up call

Steve Benen on last month's rise in unemployment:

As Republicans dominate the agenda, and Congress tackles abortion bills and austerity measures, the economy is faltering badly.

Indeed, we’re already seeing the results of austerity — state and local governments are being forced to cut spending, and as a result, tens of thousands of public-sector workers are being forced from their jobs. This, in a nutshell, is the agenda Republicans are desperate to bring to the federal level.

In other words, the GOP has a plan to make matters much worse.

As awful as this morning’s jobs report was, it should, in theory, have one important upside: policymakers who were content to ignore job creation and focus on the deficit just got a startling reminder that those priorities are backwards. The stimulus made the jobs landscape better, and now that the Recovery Act has largely run its course, the job market is deteriorating.

The dominant theory on Capitol Hill is that everything will get magically better just as soon as we take money out of the economy, scrap public investments, focus on inflation that doesn’t exist, and prioritize the debt over the economy.

It didn’t work for Hoover, but congressional Republicans are slow learners.

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John Edwards has been indicted by federal grand jury

News out of North Carolina today:

A federal grand jury has indicted two-time Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards on four counts of illegal campaign contributions, one count of conspiracy and one count of false statements.

A warrant has been issued for his arrest, and he is expected to appear in a Winston-Salem courtroom Friday afternoon.

The indictment follows a high-profile investigation that lasted more than two years into how Edwards' 2008 campaign covered up his affair with staffer Rielle Hunter, who later gave birth to his daughter.

Seriously, what a wasted career. The guy had everything. Read the rest of this post...

Much lower job growth than expected. Unemployment up to 9.1%

Not great economic news today. Slow job growth. Unemployment is up:

After several months of strong job growth, hiring slowed sharply in May, raising concerns once again about the underlying strength of the economic recovery.

The Labor Department reported on Friday that the United States added 54,000 nonfarm payroll jobs last month, following an increase of 232,000 jobs in April. May’s job gain was about a third of what economists had been forecasting.

The unemployment rate ticked up to 9.1 percent from 9.0 percent in April.

This probably has Republicans rejoicing. They've done everything possible to thwart Obama's efforts to fix the economy -- and, to a large extent, he and his team let them. Now, the debate in DC is all about the debt, not job creation.

We need jobs in this country. Someone needs to address that.

UPDATE: Here's the White House statement, from Austan Goolsbee:

Today’s employment report shows that private sector payrolls increased by 83,000 in May and the unemployment rate ticked up to 9.1 percent. There are always bumps on the road to recovery, but the overall trajectory of the economy has improved dramatically over the past two years.

While the private sector has added more than 2.1 million jobs over the past 15 months, the unemployment rate is unacceptably high and faster growth is needed to replace the jobs lost in the downturn. The initiatives put in place by this Administration – such as the payroll tax cut and business incentives for investment – have contributed to solid employment growth overall this year, but this report is a reminder of the challenges that remain. We are focused on promoting exports, reducing regulatory burdens and making the investments in education, research and development, and infrastructure that will grow our economy and create jobs. We will continue to work with Congress to responsibly reduce the deficit and live within our means.

Overall payroll employment rose by 54,000 in May. Solid employment increases occurred in professional and business services (+44,000) and education and health services (+34,000). Sectors with employment declines included local government (-28,000), retail trade (-8,500), and manufacturing (-5,000). Despite the decline this month, manufacturing has added 238,000 jobs since the beginning of 2010, the best period of manufacturing job growth in over a decade.

The monthly employment and unemployment numbers are volatile and employment estimates are subject to substantial revision. Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.

A lot of people will read a lot into this one monthly report, especially all those Americans who are unemployed. And, note the reference to the deficit. It's become a White House talking point, thanks to the GOP.

One more thing. What Atrios says:

+54K total jobs, including -29K public sector jobs. AUSTERITY NOW AND FOREVER BITCHES. Unemployment increases to 9.1%. Emp-pop unchanged.

So, uh, not good news.

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More bloodshed as protests and violence continues in Syria

The protesters have to know that they are running an enormous risk yet they still keep showing up. Al Jazeera:

Syrian security forces have killed at least 13 civilians in the latest crackdown on pro-democracy protests, rights groups say, as opposition leaders meeting in Turkey called for president Bashar al-Assad to step down and lay the framework for democratic elections to be held within a year.

Security forces, backed by tanks, have laid siege to the central town of Rastan since Sunday in an effort to crush protests against Assad's rule there.

The 13 civilians were killed by gunfire from snipers and security forces storming Rastan, which is under curfew, said Ammar Qurabi, the head of the Syrian Organisation for Human Rights, and Razan Zaitouna, a lawyer.

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Time to end the so-called war on drugs?

Uh oh, the defense industry won't like this either. It's been profitable for them since they're able to sell plenty of weapons and modern technology to fight this supposed war that the world is always losing. Personally I'm a beer and wine person but I can see no reason why the world should continue this other wasteful war. Unfortunately the political class is much too afraid of any real changes (regardless of the issue) so there's little chance they will listen. The Independent:

It isn't working. It never has worked. And so long as it continues to be fought in its current form, the "war on drugs" will do little to curb the spread of illegal narcotics or prevent hundreds of thousands of people from continuing to lose their lives each year as a result of the international drug trade.

So says a panel of world leaders who called yesterday for the biggest shake-up of drug laws in half a century. "The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world," declared the Global Commission on Drug Policy. "Fundamental reforms... are urgently needed."

The Commission, which counts the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan along with former presidents of Brazil, Mexico and Colombia as members, believes governments must now experiment with "legal regulation of drugs." "This recommendation applies especially to cannabis," reads a major report it published in New York yesterday. "But we would also encourage other experiments in decriminalisation."

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Sony hacked again

Maybe Sony should start thinking about security for their customers.

Sony has been hit by a second massive data breach, hackers claim, another potential embarrassment for a company that is struggling to restore its image following the loss of millions of credit card numbers through its PlayStation Network.

The hackers, who call themselves LulzSec, said they pulled off what they described as an elementary attack to highlight Sony's "disgraceful" security.

"Every bit of data we took wasn't encrypted. Sony stored over 1,000,000 passwords of its customers in plaintext, which means it's just a matter of taking it," LulzSec said in a statement. "They were asking for it."

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EU E. coli a new strain of bacteria

Hearing of a new super bug is probably not what anyone wants to hear right now. Spain is still furious with the German government that blamed the problem on Spain despite the clear lack of proof. What is odd is that the problems do appear to be limited to a particular area in Germany which suggests a potential problem in the food transportation or storage system. Investigations continue but in the meantime, raw vegetables are sitting idle in the stores because consumers are afraid of becoming ill.

The World Health Organization said Thursday that the E. coli bacteria responsible for a deadly outbreak that has left 18 dead and sickened hundreds in Europe is a new strain that has never been seen before.

Preliminary genetic sequencing suggests the strain is a mutant form of two different E. coli bacteria, with aggressive genes that could explain why the Europe-wide outbreak appears to be so massive and dangerous, the agency said.

Hilde Kruse, a food safety expert at the WHO, told The Associated Press that "this is a unique strain that has never been isolated from patients before."

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